


The Kids Aren't Alright

by MalecAcid



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Allison Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Angst, Ben Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Crack Fic, Diego Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Fear, Gen, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Light Angst, Listen this is sad and im sad, Luther Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Needles, No Incest, Number Five | The Boy Needs A Hug, Tattoos, Vanya Hargreeves Needs A Hug, but also it feels weirdly like a crack fic?, but in the words of gabe; this is a lighthearted exploration of their trauma, even though its not supposed to be kcmxkcksk, idk how to tag but basically they're all sad and I'm sad, im gonna tag it anyways, please check the tws in the notes before you read, thats about it, there are a lot of them mfkdkxk, weird phrasing but i get it and ily
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:20:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25440778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MalecAcid/pseuds/MalecAcid
Summary: Needles had a certain… reputation, with the Hargreeves siblings.~^~Or 'getting over' a fear isn't going to be as easy as the sibs thought.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 69





	The Kids Aren't Alright

**Author's Note:**

> TRIGGER WARNINGS//PLEASE READ 
> 
> //Very descriptive of needles and needles being used on people//Drugs and descriptive talk of someone using drugs//Talk about blood//
> 
> Please stay safe while reading 🥺

Needles had a certain… reputation, with the Hargreeves siblings. 

Having a symbol forever engraved onto your body against your will would never be described as a fun time, but the image forever plastered onto the wrists of the siblings wasn't the only lasting effect. Probably wouldn't have even been considered the most changing effect. 

Having their arm pinned down by a man they had never met while he ran a needle over their wrist had been engraved into their minds since the day they had turned thirteen. Not the funnest birthday present they had ever gotten. 

Either way, that day would be forever stuck in the seven kids' memories. Even Vanya could remember that day vividly. Which left most of them with a slight… aversion. To needles. 

~^~

Klaus was the first one to 'get over' his fear of needles. 

He was nineteen, and had been living on the streets for almost two years. Crashing in alleyways as he stole and pawned things to get the drugs that kept the ghosts at bay. 

He had never gone any further than smoking and pills, though. He didn't want to go anywhere near a needle, and he knew that Ben was uncomfortable with it as well, so he never tried. 

Until one day, his usual dealer didn't have anything else. He was out of pills, out of weed, but he had something else. Something that Klaus traded more money than usual for with shaking hands as ghosts began to pop up and scream repeatedly from around him. 

He stumbled towards the nearest empty alleyway, clamping his hands over his ears as the screams of the dead began to grow louder and louder. He collapsed against the side of the building, clenching his eyes shut as he hit his head lightly against the brick wall in an attempt to steel himself. 

He shivered as the ghosts hands swatted at him, through him. He picked up the previously discarded bag at his side, opened it with shaky hands and pulled the needle out, staring at it with hesitant eyes. 

That was when a particularly loud ghost decided to scream in his ear and swat a cold hand through his head, and he thought, fuck it. What's a needle compared to the sight of the gore ridden dead? He would gladly relive the tattoo over and over again if it meant that he no longer had to think about the ghosts. If it meant he had never been locked inside of the mausoleum. Trapped. 

He took one glance at Ben, barely able to see him through the other ghosts, and watched as he turned away. He looked back to his arm and swiftly stuck the needle into his vein, pushing down on the plunger as he looked away as well, slowly taking it out of his arm and throwing it to the other side of the alley as the high started to kick in. 

The ghosts faded away faster than they ever had before, all but one of them, who looked especially nauseous and equally as disappointed. Could ghosts even feel nauseous? Ben sure looked as if he did as be eyed the needle at the end of the alley. 

It took days before the ghosts began to trickle back into focus. Longer than it had ever taken before. 

Klaus didn't hesitate with needles after that. 

~^~

For Luther, all the tattoo did was serve as a reminder of the siblings he no longer talked to. Of the siblings that left him behind. So no, he didn't like the tattoo. 

For him, 'getting over' his fear of needles was a slow process. A process that started long after his brothers and sisters left him behind. 

He had walked into the kitchen one day, prepared to eat another lonely breakfast, only to see a set up of two chairs. A man with a tattoo setup in one and the other empty, his father staring at him as he came down the steps hesitantly, hand gripping the banister tightly. 

"Number One. It has been brought to my attention that your umbrella symbol has begun to fade. You will get it redone at least once every two years from now on. Sit." He gestured towards the chair harshly, and Luther rushed forward, back rigid as he sat in the chair and attempted not to look as he heard the machine begin to buzz. Ignoring the way that his father walked out and the way the needle pushed the unwanted ink into his skin. 

His father had kept his word. Every two years after that day, he had the umbrella redone on his wrist. The tattoo stayed dark, lines of the ink sharp as his siblings own tattoos had faded. 

Slowly but surely, Luther began to grow used to needles. It's not to say that he enjoyed them, but he wasn't shaking anymore as the tattoo artist pushed the ink under his skin. He stopped flinching at the sight of a needle. He didn't wait in dreadful anticipation as the day he had to get the tattoo redone came. He was used to it. 

He didn't consider himself afraid, though he didn't consider himself quite comfortable, either.

~^~

Ben wouldn't say that he 'got over' his fear of needles, per say. 

He would definitely say that he had grown used to the sight of them, though. He would've had to, eventually. 

He had watched Klaus go through so many needles. Drug wise and tattoo wise. He didn't have like it, though. 

In the beginning, he looked away, feeling nauseous and panicky at just the sight of the sharp object, but as time grew on, he found himself almost completely numb to the whole ordeal. 

Though seeing and watching someone use a needle and getting one used in himself was two completely different things, Ben knew. He didn't ever want to find out what would happen if someone came close to him, needle in hand, intent to use it on him. And he never would find out, considering he was dead, and would probably, definetely, stay that way. 

So, he really wouldn't say that he 'got over' his fear of needles. More so he just grew used to the sight of them. He would continue to flinch as someone with a needle turned in his direction, even though he knew they couldn't see him. He would continue to turn away as Klaus stuck more and more needles into his arm, because, who would want to see that? 

Ben leaves it at that. Gives no more thought to his not so fun past with needles. Maybe Klaus would call him unhealthy for ignoring his so-called trauma, as if Klaus and his coping mechanisms weren't more unhealthy than all of the city combined. 

It didn't matter anyways, Ben thought grimly. He was dead, so he would never have to think about getting stuck with a needle again. Right? 

~^~

Allison wouldn't say that she had a fear of needles. Wouldn't say that she ever developed one. You can't get over a fear you've never had. 

She never was brought back to the time several years ago where a symbol was engraved onto her wrist against her will. She wouldn't say that the event affected her in any way other than the ink that would remain permanently under her skin. 

That wasn't to say she wasn't nervous around needles. Who wasn't, though? 

Being shaky as a doctor came towards her with a needle was normal. Being nervous to talk with her actor friends because she knew that they would recommend needle treatments was normal. She wasn't afraid of needles. 

She just… didn't like them. And who did? No one she knew gladly accepted being stabbed by a needle. No one she knew wasn't shaky when they had to get blood work done. It was normal. 

Though, she did notice something change as the years went on. She began to grow less hesitant about the thought of needles. Grew less shaky when a doctor would come at her with one. Didn't begin to panic at just the thought of another tattoo. 

Maybe she had been afraid of needles, after all. But now, she just didn't like them. 

~^~

For forty-five years, the thought of needles had never even crossed Fives mind. He'd been a little… preoccupied, the last four decades. 

That was until The Handler picked him up from his spot in the apocalypse, made him an assassin, he escaped and broke his contract and then time traveled to eight days before the apocalypse. So yeah, he didn't have much time to think about needles. Not since he'd left at age thirteen, anyways. 

But, they had finally stopped the apocalypse. The commission was off of their backs, and all the siblings were living in the academy until Five knew for sure that nothing had to be changed. And he finally had some free time, which was… weird. 

That didn't mean he was going to use that newly found free time to think about needles, though. Instead he stayed up all day and night, driven by coffee and spite, and watched, cautious, as he waited for something to happen. It was too bad he now had a caring family to force well being onto him. 

It had started when Allison came up to him late one night as he was pouring his seventh cup of coffee for the day. She gently grabbed the full mug from his hands and he rolled his eyes, huffing as he stared her down, ignoring the concern in her gaze. 

"You need to sleep more." She had said, voice quiet, still in the healing process. He crossed his arms for a second before uncrossing them and grabbing the coffee cup from where she placed it on the counter, taking a sip and tubring away from her. 

He heard her sigh, and listened as she walked away, the footsteps getting quieter and quieter the further she got, until he heard the door to her room shut behind her. 

He supposed that the family meetings were his fault, considering the fact that he suggested them in the first place. He just didn't know that one would ever center around him. 

When they all had suggested that he let Grace check him over, considering she had already done so to the rest of them since the whole time travel debacle, he had sighed, and nodded. He ignored the churning in his stomach and instead focused on the look of relief on his siblings faces. Focused on the way they seemed to care. 

When mom came at him with a needle that next morning, he hid his flinch well, back ridged as he pushed down the panic clawing its way up his throat. She stuck the needle into his arm, and he relaxed immediately after she took it out a bit later. 

Sure, Five never 'got over' his fear of needles, but who had the time? Not him, that's for sure. 

~^~ 

Diego was definitely not one to hide his aversion to needles. Not that he could, with the involuntary fainting and all. 

He didn't even like to think about the sharp object. Reading or even just hearing the word made him feel nauseous, made his face go pale as the blood rushed down to his feet, made him feel a need to sit down before he fell down. 

He never really confronted this fear, more so he avoided it. He didn't go to the doctors, didn't get tattoos and avoided any conversation even possibly leading to the topic of needles. He even ended up getting kicked out of the police academy because he was unwilling to get blood work done. 

But he would get needles if he absolutely needed to. If someone's life hung in the balance and their only chance of survival relied on Diego having to have a needle stuck into his arm, he would do it. He just never expected that to happen. 

He was completely and utterly prepared to give his arm to Grace, very ready for her to stick a needle into it to save Allison's life. He couldn't wait, even. He just didn't expect himself to faint at the sight. 

Sure, he'd felt nauseous and slightly light headed as he offered his arm up, but that didn't mean he was prepared to pass out, only to wake up moments later, see the needle stuck in his arm, and pass out again. 

So no, Diego never really 'got over' his fear of needles. But it's not like he would ever have to think about them again. Probably. 

~^~

Vanya never had a fear of needles. 

She wasn't like Allison, denying and ignoring the fear until it went away, no, she genuinely did not have a fear of needles. 

But she definitely didn't seek them out, either. 

For years, as a child, she envied her brothers and sister. She watched as a symbol was placed permanently on their wrists, another binding factor between the siblings that she was once again left out of. She didn't notice their cries, or the pain on their faces as the unknown man pinned their arms down as she drew her own symbol on her wrist with washable marker. 

As the years went by, the desperation to be connected with her siblings slowly vanished, and instead came realization of how terribly affected they were by something she wished that she had. 

Slowly the memories of their faces that day came to mind. She remembered the tears. She remembered the flinches and the shaking and the noises of pain. She didn't get any tattoos. 

Avoiding needles didn't mean that when the time came to get them she was shaky or nauseous, though. She didn't like needles, but she wasn't afraid to get them. She didn't have an aversion to them, a fear of them. 

They were just there. No correlation with anything. They just existed. 

Besides, you don't need to 'get over' a fear you never had in the first place. 

~^~ 

So yeah. Needles definitely had a reputation with the Hagreeves. Their dad messed them up. 

But were they going to let that define them? 

No.

**Author's Note:**

> Wow I'm sad. Also did this feel like a crack fic or an angst fic or neither or both? I don't really know what's going on here tbh mfkxkcksksk


End file.
